[OutsiderFan]

I know there are some Stanford fans who can't wrap their heads around Stanford being a pre-season Top 5 college football program.  The Bootleg article about Stanford second year starting QBs to me provides some solid evidence as to why the heads of doubters should expand.

It's a free story so everyone can read it, but the conclusion is pretty compelling.  Stanford's 3rd down efficiency has approved every year there has been a returning starting QB.  The average improvement has been about 10%, which is a significant improvement.  Stanford's offense converted 3rd downs at a 45% clip with Hogan, which was itself 10% better than Nunes.

If Hogan improves even by 5% Stanford's offense will convert 3rd downs at 50%, a truly impressive number for any team, but it would seem he would actually be more of a 10% improvement type of guy.  He's got the OL, backs, and improved WRs to make it happen.

But as the story makes clear, 3rd down efficiency is not just about offense.  Maintaining the ball also helps the defense be stronger.  And Stanford has its best defense in 2013 than maybe ever, both in terms of overall talent and depth.  I get there are some inexperienced receivers, but even they are more talented physically than the guys they are replacing. 

I just can't see why Stanford fans shouldn't be very bullish on a Top 5 pre-season ranking.  If not now, when?  So eff the woofing god nonsense and embrace the fact your team is poised to be awesome.  Hold your chest out and brag to your fan friends of teams on the Stanford schedule how they are going down!  This is the best time to be a fan and you should be enjoying the hell out of being the top dog.  Enjoy it when you can because you never know when things may start slipping.

[OutsiderFan]

I know there are some Stanford fans who can't wrap their heads around Stanford being a pre-season Top 5 college football program.  The Bootleg article about Stanford second year starting QBs to me provides some solid evidence as to why the heads of doubters should expand.

It's a free story so everyone can read it, but the conclusion is pretty compelling.  Stanford's 3rd down efficiency has approved every year there has been a returning starting QB.  The average improvement has been about 10%, which is a significant improvement.  Stanford's offense converted 3rd downs at a 45% clip with Hogan, which was itself 10% better than Nunes.

If Hogan improves even by 5% Stanford's offense will convert 3rd downs at 50%, a truly impressive number for any team, but it would seem he would actually be more of a 10% improvement type of guy.  He's got the OL, backs, and improved WRs to make it happen.

But as the story makes clear, 3rd down efficiency is not just about offense.  Maintaining the ball also helps the defense be stronger.  And Stanford has its best defense in 2013 than maybe ever, both in terms of overall talent and depth.  I get there are some inexperienced receivers, but even they are more talented physically than the guys they are replacing. 

I just can't see why Stanford fans shouldn't be very bullish on a Top 5 pre-season ranking.  If not now, when?  So eff the woofing god nonsense and embrace the fact your team is poised to be awesome.  Hold your chest out and brag to your fan friends of teams on the Stanford schedule how they are going down!  This is the best time to be a fan and you should be enjoying the hell out of being the top dog.  Enjoy it when you can because you never know when things may start slipping.

[Bruce Wang]

I wonder if the potential for improvement for Hogan from his first season to his second is greater than Luck's.  Having a father who played the position professionally surely contributed to Luck arriving on campus much more polished.  Luck probably could have started as a true frosh.  Hogan wasn't ready to take the reins until the Colorado game.

Combine Hogan's improvement with greater WR talent and the multi-headed monster at RB, this offense could be special.

[Bruce Wang]

I wonder if the potential for improvement for Hogan from his first season to his second is greater than Luck's.  Having a father who played the position professionally surely contributed to Luck arriving on campus much more polished.  Luck probably could have started as a true frosh.  Hogan wasn't ready to take the reins until the Colorado game.

Combine Hogan's improvement with greater WR talent and the multi-headed monster at RB, this offense could be special.

[FarmBoy]

Not speaking for all Stanford fans, the reason I'm gun shy on our 2013 prospects is because I remember how razor thin the margin of error was in 2012. This is not the 2010 or 2011 team that regularly blew out the competition. In '12, 8 of our 12 wins came by a margin of 7 or fewer points. If 1 or 2 plays go a different way, we don't go to the Rose Bowl. Sure you could argue that if 1-2 plays go differently against UW and ND, we would place in the BCS championship, but I think the ball bounced in our favor more often than the opposite.

I wholly expect that the 2013 team will be improved on offense and will be comparable, if not better, on defense. The point about Hogan's opportunity for improvement is a great one to consider and should reduce the margin of error greatly, even if we're losing 99% of our rushing and receiving yard play makers. Still, I don't think I'm ready to think of this team, with the question marks they have, as a top 5 team until I've seen how they do in their first 3 games.

[FarmBoy]

Not speaking for all Stanford fans, the reason I'm gun shy on our 2013 prospects is because I remember how razor thin the margin of error was in 2012. This is not the 2010 or 2011 team that regularly blew out the competition. In '12, 8 of our 12 wins came by a margin of 7 or fewer points. If 1 or 2 plays go a different way, we don't go to the Rose Bowl. Sure you could argue that if 1-2 plays go differently against UW and ND, we would place in the BCS championship, but I think the ball bounced in our favor more often than the opposite.

I wholly expect that the 2013 team will be improved on offense and will be comparable, if not better, on defense. The point about Hogan's opportunity for improvement is a great one to consider and should reduce the margin of error greatly, even if we're losing 99% of our rushing and receiving yard play makers. Still, I don't think I'm ready to think of this team, with the question marks they have, as a top 5 team until I've seen how they do in their first 3 games.

[washingtonismoney]

I remember how razor thin the margin of error was in 2012.

In general I would agree -- I place a brobdingnagian importance on margin of victory and an edge in yards per play -- but I don't in this specific case. One: the schedule was quite difficult -- depending on who you ask, it was between a top 25 and top 10 schedule, difficulty-wise. Two: the transformation of the offense by Hogan. You won't see it in the headline statistics -- about 27 points per game pre- and post-Hogan -- but of course Hogan's stretch was by far more difficult, which masks offensive improvement. If the team were playing as well at the beginning of the season as it was at the end,  it would've accumulated much more impressive scoring margins.

But I am wary about Stanford's performance relative to a top 5 preseason standard. The reason for my concern is that you need to have an elite offense and defense. With the amount of overhaul in the offense, my reasonably-good-case scenario is that we'll be at that high standard in 2014, not 2013. Everything might come together perfectly in 2013 offensively, as it did in 2010 or (in the defensive backfield) in 2012. But, on the other hand, it might not. I think the team has the potential to be a top 5 team, but I don't see it as especially more likely than a lot of other teams.

We outscored teams by 10 per game last year -- a solid margin, one that makes a 10 win regular season a nice goal. To get up into the unbeaten regular season range, you need to be outscoring teams (generally; N.D. last year was an exception, but I think it proves the rule) by about 20 or so. Can we jump 10 ppg in a year? Some of the factors I mentioned above can do some of the job, but my intuition is that it's too far too fast in most scenarios. I don't rule out the upside scenario, though.

[washingtonismoney]

I remember how razor thin the margin of error was in 2012.

In general I would agree -- I place a brobdingnagian importance on margin of victory and an edge in yards per play -- but I don't in this specific case. One: the schedule was quite difficult -- depending on who you ask, it was between a top 25 and top 10 schedule, difficulty-wise. Two: the transformation of the offense by Hogan. You won't see it in the headline statistics -- about 27 points per game pre- and post-Hogan -- but of course Hogan's stretch was by far more difficult, which masks offensive improvement. If the team were playing as well at the beginning of the season as it was at the end,  it would've accumulated much more impressive scoring margins.

But I am wary about Stanford's performance relative to a top 5 preseason standard. The reason for my concern is that you need to have an elite offense and defense. With the amount of overhaul in the offense, my reasonably-good-case scenario is that we'll be at that high standard in 2014, not 2013. Everything might come together perfectly in 2013 offensively, as it did in 2010 or (in the defensive backfield) in 2012. But, on the other hand, it might not. I think the team has the potential to be a top 5 team, but I don't see it as especially more likely than a lot of other teams.

We outscored teams by 10 per game last year -- a solid margin, one that makes a 10 win regular season a nice goal. To get up into the unbeaten regular season range, you need to be outscoring teams (generally; N.D. last year was an exception, but I think it proves the rule) by about 20 or so. Can we jump 10 ppg in a year? Some of the factors I mentioned above can do some of the job, but my intuition is that it's too far too fast in most scenarios. I don't rule out the upside scenario, though.

[george]

If Hogan improves even by 5% Stanford's offense will convert 3rd downs at 50%, a truly impressive number for any team, but it would seem he would actually be more of a 10% improvement type of guy.  He's got the OL, backs, and improved WRs to make it happen.

There's no question that it's really fun to read these articles and feel like you have empirical evidence to back up the national championship dreams (I've gone into every season since 1995 thinking we're going to win the national championship.)  But what I would've loved to see in this article is a mention of the spring game.  I love Kevin Hogan -- his brand of competitiveness and tenacity makes me proud to call him a Stanford man.  But his performance in the spring game was not a 10% improvement over last year.  He was ostensibly working on improving his deep ball over the winter and spring, but there was little evidence of gains in this area during the spring game.  More concerning was the fact that the he seemed to have regressed on the short to medium throws and rollouts that were so key to success last year.

Of course our defense played a large role in making his job harder.  Also we heard Shaw talk about him needing to settle down and play.  So maybe there were some nerves.  But I guess I had hoped that a guy who didn't flinch in his first road start at Oregon, beat UCLA twice in a row to clinch a rose bowl berth, and has never lost a game would be able to handle the expectations around the spring game.  Seeing Matt Barkley crack under the pressure this year at USC makes me appreciate Andrew Luck's amazing accomplishments even more.  I'm trying my best not to hold Kevin Hogan to the Andrew Luck standard, but it's hard to avoid it. 

The reality is that as good as our defense is and the fact that we have a promising line and several returning running backs and athletes at other skill positions, I think the reason that most people have such high hopes for us is Kevin Hogan.  He was terrific as the underdog.  How is he going to handle being the favorite?

[george]

If Hogan improves even by 5% Stanford's offense will convert 3rd downs at 50%, a truly impressive number for any team, but it would seem he would actually be more of a 10% improvement type of guy.  He's got the OL, backs, and improved WRs to make it happen.

There's no question that it's really fun to read these articles and feel like you have empirical evidence to back up the national championship dreams (I've gone into every season since 1995 thinking we're going to win the national championship.)  But what I would've loved to see in this article is a mention of the spring game.  I love Kevin Hogan -- his brand of competitiveness and tenacity makes me proud to call him a Stanford man.  But his performance in the spring game was not a 10% improvement over last year.  He was ostensibly working on improving his deep ball over the winter and spring, but there was little evidence of gains in this area during the spring game.  More concerning was the fact that the he seemed to have regressed on the short to medium throws and rollouts that were so key to success last year.

Of course our defense played a large role in making his job harder.  Also we heard Shaw talk about him needing to settle down and play.  So maybe there were some nerves.  But I guess I had hoped that a guy who didn't flinch in his first road start at Oregon, beat UCLA twice in a row to clinch a rose bowl berth, and has never lost a game would be able to handle the expectations around the spring game.  Seeing Matt Barkley crack under the pressure this year at USC makes me appreciate Andrew Luck's amazing accomplishments even more.  I'm trying my best not to hold Kevin Hogan to the Andrew Luck standard, but it's hard to avoid it. 

The reality is that as good as our defense is and the fact that we have a promising line and several returning running backs and athletes at other skill positions, I think the reason that most people have such high hopes for us is Kevin Hogan.  He was terrific as the underdog.  How is he going to handle being the favorite?

[washingtonismoney]

But his performance in the spring game was not a 10% improvement over last year. 

Probably over-interpreting from a limited data set there. Didn't the 2010 spring game end in a 3-3 tie? That certainly wasn't an improvement from Luck's perspective. It's a simulation of some stuff they kind of want to try out -- they barely ran the ball at all. So I don't think we can take too much from it, performance-wise. (Though I thought Hogan was largely fine after he shook off his poor start.)

[washingtonismoney]

But his performance in the spring game was not a 10% improvement over last year. 

Probably over-interpreting from a limited data set there. Didn't the 2010 spring game end in a 3-3 tie? That certainly wasn't an improvement from Luck's perspective. It's a simulation of some stuff they kind of want to try out -- they barely ran the ball at all. So I don't think we can take too much from it, performance-wise. (Though I thought Hogan was largely fine after he shook off his poor start.)

[FarmBoy]

With the amount of overhaul in the offense, my reasonably-good-case scenario is that we'll be at that high standard in 2014, not 2013.

But 2014 will likely have huuuuuuge turnover in the defense, just as we're getting settled on the offense. Our defense will be losing Gardner, Murphy, Skov, Browning, Carrington, and AManam through eligibility, and potentially losing Reynolds, Richards, and 1-2 others to early entry.

On paper, 2013 seems like our better opportunity to have a national impact. Hopefully the offense can jell quickly against SJSU and Army, teams not known for their stout defense.

[FarmBoy]

With the amount of overhaul in the offense, my reasonably-good-case scenario is that we'll be at that high standard in 2014, not 2013.

But 2014 will likely have huuuuuuge turnover in the defense, just as we're getting settled on the offense. Our defense will be losing Gardner, Murphy, Skov, Browning, Carrington, and AManam through eligibility, and potentially losing Reynolds, Richards, and 1-2 others to early entry.

On paper, 2013 seems like our better opportunity to have a national impact. Hopefully the offense can jell quickly against SJSU and Army, teams not known for their stout defense.

[washingtonismoney]

But 2014 will likely have huuuuuuge turnover in the defense...

I meant "that high standard [on offense]." Obviously by then the defense may be too unsettled. (This is why winning a national championship is really hard.)

Here's an article in the National Football Post on Stanford's offense: http://www.nationalfootballpost.com/Stan...Hogan.html

[washingtonismoney]

But 2014 will likely have huuuuuuge turnover in the defense...

I meant "that high standard [on offense]." Obviously by then the defense may be too unsettled. (This is why winning a national championship is really hard.)

Here's an article in the National Football Post on Stanford's offense: http://www.nationalfootballpost.com/Stan...Hogan.html